Iteration Paris
by Darkpenn
Summary: All or nothing. Last effort. To the death.


**Iteration Paris**

 _All or nothing. Last effort. To the death._

* * *

The dropship was bucking, aflame, spinning out of control over Paris – ruined, flooded, infested Paris – when J Squad dropped. Nance and Kuntz were sent spiralling away from the others, swirling into the night.

They splashed down into filthy shallow water. Smelled like a sewer, but worse.

"And to think I had always wanted to see Paris," muttered Nance.

They could hear firing, and they started for it, wading along in their jackets, in the strange luminescent half-light.

"A helluva thing," said Nance. "A damn helluva thing. This time thing, with Cage and the woman."

Kuntz gave a grunt.

"You believe it?" said Nance. She remembered that Cage, back in the barracks – damn, was it only an hour ago? – had said something to Kuntz, but the others had not been able to hear what it was. He had said something to her, too, softly, just a whisper in her ear. Her secret.

Kuntz shrugged. "Stranger things happened," he said.

She nodded. "Yeah, stranger things," she muttered.

The firing had stopped but now they heard something else. The engines of the dropship starting up.

They crested a rise and looked down, into what remained of a little square. They could see what was left of the dropship start to crawl, slowly, painfully. There was Cage and Full Metal, with Ford on the side gun. Griff and Skinner were on the other side of the square, firing, their backs to a petrol tanker, mimics charging at them. And then the tanker went up in a cascade of flame, incinerating dozens of mimics.

The dropship was moving, picking up speed, heading across the square. But a massive troop of mimics was between it and that weird glass pyramid thing.

"They won't make it," said Kuntz. "There's too many."

"Then let's even it up," said Nance. She raised her gun and started to pour fire into the mimics. So did Kuntz.

The wave of mimics turned, most of them coming for Nance and Kuntz, the closer targets. Spinning, wheeling, howling, screaming for blood.

"Come on, you miserable fuckers!" shouted Nance to them. _"_ _Come on!"_

All or nothing. Last effort. To the death.

Too late, the mimics realised that the dropship had got past. Many of them turned back, but they were behind it now, not in front. Chasing, not barricading.

But a dozen of them continued to charge at Nance and Kuntz. No, not a dozen, not now. Ten. Eight. Five. Four.

And then the mimics had reached them, their tentacles spearing out. Nance took one in the chest, Kuntz in the shoulder and the leg. But somehow they stayed up on their feet, still shooting.

Three left. Two.

Their guns clicked on empty.

The last one, injured but still coming, threw its tentacles out, hitting both of them again. But now Nance had her big knife drawn. Louisiana steel. She plunged it into the heart of the creature. It screamed one final time.

Nance and Kuntz sagged down. They were both cut to pieces. Bleeding. Broken.

"Looks like we're both gonna die," said Nance. "Son of a bitch."

Kuntz grunted. Then he pointed. The dropship had made it to the pyramid.

"Huh," she said. "Hey, Kuntz, tell me something. What was the secret that Cage told you, to get you to come?"

Kuntz gave another little grunt. "It's my name," he said. "Doesn't really have a z at the end. The guy changed it when I enlisted. But there's no z."

"Huh," said Nance again. "You know, I think I like it better without the z. You want to know my secret?"

But Kuntz was dead.

She touched her wounds. Blood was flowing. Not long now. But the pain seemed a long way away, as if it belonged to another version of herself.

She looked at the pyramid, thinking what a strange thing it was, here, now. And then there was a massive explosion, a shock wave screaming from it. It swept up all the mimics she could see, washing over them, turning them into blackened carcasses. The wave kept going, spreading, sweeping towards the edge of the city, and beyond, towards the horizon.

"Damn," she said softly to herself. "They did it. They really fucking did it. Cage and the Full Metal woman."

She smiled. Then she closed her eyes, and thought of home.

END


End file.
